Archaeologists Expand Live Online Greek and Roman Workshops into the Evening

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The Lukeion Project, which offers live online classes about the Greek and Roman world, will begin offering evening classes in March 2006.

Holly Springs, NC (PRWEB)February 24, 2006 –

The Lukeion Project is listening to all those arm-chair archaeologists and history buffs who are looking for new ways to pursue their love of the ancient world. Starting March 7, 2006, its live, online enrichment courses about the Classical World will be available in the evening for those who are unable to attend during the day.

The Lukeion Project was founded by two archeologists turned online educators, who together have more than 20 years experience researching, traveling and excavating in the Mediterranean area. They’ve participated in archaeological expeditions in Jordan, Greece, and Turkey. Now they’re sharing their education and experience through distance learning.

“Our current learners come from a wide variety of backgrounds,” said Amy Barr, one of the founders of the Lukeion Project. “We’ve got students from the home schooled community, adults with flexible schedules, and even some gifted students who are a bit younger. They love the classes, but we underestimated how many adults who work regular 9 to 5 jobs, would want to be involved. We’ve been getting calls and emails begging us to offer evening classes.”

“There aren’t too many choices for people who would like a class on the archaeology of Athens, or the life of Alexander the Great, or the Mythology of the Olympian Gods,” said Regan Barr, co-founder of the Lukeion Project. “They usually need to find a university course that fits their schedule, go through the hassle of registration, possibly send in transcripts, and spend a lot of time making sure they don’t drop the ball somewhere in the process. It’s just too much. Lots of community colleges or continuing education centers make it easy to take classes in database development or French cooking; but where do you go to hear a fresh perspective on Julius Caesar’s fling with Cleopatra, or the 4-story-tall gold and ivory statue of Zeus at Olympia? That’s where we come in.”

The Lukeion Project uses a broad interdisciplinary approach that integrates history, archaeology, ancient literature and art history to offer a unique online learning experience. The virtual classroom delivers visual content directly to the learner’s computer screen and audio is distributed to the learner’s PC speakers using internet audio broadcast. Because classes are live, rather than pre-recorded tutorials, attendees can interact with the instructor through a variety of feedback, question, chat, and polling functions.

The new evening classes will start at 8:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. The first courses scheduled will be 4-week workshops that allow learners to pick and choose new areas of interest each month. “We’ll see how these go, and if demand is high, we’ll start offering our semester long classes in the evening this fall,” said Amy Barr.